The aim of this note is to show that the cycle decomposition of elements of the symmetric group admits a quite natural formulation in the framework of dual Coxeter theory, allowing a generalization of it to the family of so-called parabolic quasi-Coxeter elements of Coxeter groups (in the symmetric group every element is a parabolic quasi-Coxeter element). We show that such an element admits an analogue of the cycle decomposition. Elements which are not in this family still admit a generalized cycle decomposition, but it is not unique in general.